by Raine, Alice
To my utter disbelief, Nathan straightened himself out almost immediately. His hair was a mess, falling over his brow, but he calmly brushed the broken glass from his palms, smoothed his hair back, and stared resolutely up at his father in some sort of silent challenge. Mr Jackson might be in charge of this situation, but it was clear Nathan would never let his father control him again.
‘Still the fucking tough guy, eh? You always were numb to the pain, you fucking freak.’
I saw pain briefly flicker in Nathan’s eyes at the insult and felt my heart crumble for my man. Nathan might be strong physically, but that tiny glimmer of pain had shown me exactly how emotionally vulnerable he was in front of his father. Thankfully, Mr Jackson seemed so absorbed in the moment that he was unaware of just how much he could hurt his son with words.
William began to get fidgety in my arms, as if sensing the tension around him, and I rocked him, praying that he would fall asleep again and not disturb this lunatic to the point where he might try to shut him up.
What a situation …
Marion started muttering softly beside me. I probably wouldn’t have heard her words if she hadn’t been sitting right next to me, but it almost seemed like she was praying. ‘Praise the lord,’ she repeated. ‘Thank goodness.’ The words were mixed with an occasional utterance of what sounded like the name “Kenny”.
Kenny? I was fairly sure there wasn’t a deity named Kenny, so I had no idea what the hell was she was on about. Maybe the stress of this situation had caused her to have some sort of breakdown. It wouldn’t be surprising. I felt really fucking close to the edge myself.
As I was about to dismiss her words as the rantings of someone who believed she was about to die, something occurred to me. Kenny. Kenny was supposed to be joining us all for lunch today. My gaze flashed to the lounge door, which was slightly ajar, and I saw a brief flash of Kenny’s bearded face in the dim light of the hallway before it disappeared again.
Glancing at Mr Jackson, I noticed that he was too focused on Nathan and Nicholas to see Kenny, and I quickly gave Marion’s hand a squeeze to try and quieten her down so she didn’t alert Mr Jackson to our visitor.
God, out of all the saviours I would have hoped for, Kenny was hardly top of my list. He was my best friend and an all-round lovely guy, but bravery was hardly a strong point for him. I hoped he would have the sense to backtrack to the garden and call the police so we might have a vague hope of getting out of here unharmed.
Straining my hearing, I listened for any distant sirens that might indicate that Kenny had placed a call to the emergency services. Instead, there was a sudden loud banging noise from the closed door behind Mr Jackson. The door that led to the kitchen.
‘What the fuck was that? Is someone else here?’ Mr Jackson demanded, glancing around the room as we all sat in stunned silence looking just as confused as he was. There was another banging noise, this time louder, and I winced as I wondered what the hell Kenny was playing at. He must have used the other door to go around the back way to the kitchen, but what was he planning on doing next? Did he even know that Mr Jackson had a gun?
I was weighing up the idea of shouting a warning to Kenny, but snapped my mouth closed again as Mr Jackson delved a hand inside his jacket and pulled a second gun from a shoulder holster.
The situation had been fucked up enough with just one gun, but now there were two. Where the fuck was he getting these things from? One gun remained trained on me, and he pointed the other in the direction of the kitchen as he cautiously edged towards the door to explore. Slowly walking past his wife, he holstered the gun that had been aimed at me. He reached for the door handle, and it was at that point that everything seemed to start happening in slow motion.
Mr Jackson had just tugged the door open a fraction and was advancing forwards when he suddenly seemed to stumble and stagger sideways. There was a soft “pop” as the gun went off, then he tumbled forwards into the dining table. A sickening crack echoed around the room as his head hit the corner of the heavy wooden table top before he collapsed in a heap on the floor with a grunt.
All of us sat in stunned silence for a millisecond, before Nathan suddenly shot into action. He leaped from his knees and dived towards his father to kick the gun from his hand. Then he quickly unsheathed the other from his holster and slid it away.
Kneeling above him so he couldn’t move, Nathan then checked for a pulse, which seemed to take forever. As he searched the skin of his father’s neck with his fingers, the room remained cloaked in tense silence. None of us moved or spoke until Nathan looked across at me, licked his lips, and slowly shook his head.
Mr Jackson was dead.
Holy crap, this is crazy.
As I was trying to digest this turn of events, Kenny popped his head out from behind the kitchen door. He walked into the room, holding a large knife in one hand and a pan in the other. His face was as pale as Nathan’s, but I saw him let out a huge breath when he noticed Mr Jackson motionless on the floor.
‘The police are on their way, and an ambulance, too,’ Kenny murmured as he dumped the knife and pan down. He winced as he limped to a chair and rubbed at his upper thigh. Following his movement, I saw a red stain was blooming on the denim of his jeans and blood coated his hand.
‘Kenny? Have you been shot?’ I squeaked, pulling Will tighter in my arms and pushing myself to standing.
‘Um. Yeah. I think so,’ he replied distantly as he started to apply pressure to the wound. ‘It only caught the side of my leg, though, so I should be fine,’ he added, which was surprisingly brave for Kenny, though I guessed the shock hadn’t hit him yet.
I wanted to help so many people at once that I barely knew where to start. My maternal instincts kicking in, I took Will to the cot we had in the lounge for his afternoon naps and laid him down before rushing back to the group of people who meant the most to me in the whole world.
I didn’t know who to go to first. Rebecca was pregnant and had been punched in the stomach, Kenny was bleeding from a gunshot wound, Nicholas was covered in cuts from crashing into the coffee table glass, Marion was a sobbing wreck, and Mrs Jackson was rocking back and forth, looking catatonic from shock.
William, my man and I seemed to be the only ones who were unscathed, and I sent a prayer of thanks to whoever might be listening.
Nathan might be physically fine, but he still looked a shadow of his usual self as he stood over his father’s body. He dug his hands into his hair before tugging harshly on the tablecloth and draping it over his father’s corpse. Pausing for a second, he stared down at the body at his feet with wild eyes and then spun towards me. He covered the distance in just a few strides and dragged me into his arms.
‘Fuck. Are you OK, Stella?’
Burying my face in his chest, I inhaled his scent, hoping the gorgeous smell might help me calm down. ‘I am … I think. That was pretty fucking crazy.’
We held each other close, forgetting everything else for just a few seconds. Nathan dropped his face into my hair as he clung to me and breathed raggedly by my ear for several moments, as if only just holding himself together.
Behind me, William started crying, but as I went to pull myself from Nathan’s embrace Marion struggled to her feet and drew in a deep breath. ‘Let me see to him. I need something to distract my mind.’
I nodded my agreement, then assessed the room. Looking to Rebecca, I saw that she was still on the sofa, clutching her stomach, with tears running down her cheeks. Nicholas knelt before her, rubbing her shoulders as if trying to get some warmth back into her system. He was speaking softly to her, but she looked so shocked that his words didn’t really seem to be getting through.
‘I feel wet. Am I wet?’ she asked.
Nicholas shook his head and lifted a hand to wipe gently at the tears on Rebecca’s face. ‘It’s just your tears. It’s OK now, baby. Lie down and rest, it’s OK.’
Rebecca didn’t lie down immediately. Instead she began to shake her head, more
tears falling as she took one of Nicholas’s hands. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she murmured as she followed his suggestion and made herself comfortable in the space that Marion had left.
As Rebecca shifted herself, several things seemed to happen at once. Firstly, Nicholas’s entire body tensed, then he shook his head over and over as he whispered under his breath, ‘ No … fuck …. No … Becky …’ At the same time, I focused my attention on the seat she had been occupying and my stomach dropped.
The white leather sofa was stained crimson, as was the crotch of her leggings.
‘Noooooooo!’ The noise Nicholas let out was the most agonising sound I think I’d ever heard. It caused goose pimples to flood my skin as terror once again flooded my system.
‘Call an ambulance,’ he muttered hoarsely towards Nathan. He frantically stroked Rebecca’s hair and trailed one hand across her body, as if trying to work out what had happened. ‘ It’s OK, baby, it’s going to be OK.’
I didn’t know if he was talking to Rebecca or their unborn child but quite clearly from the amount of blood, everything was not OK.
I couldn’t breathe properly, but thankfully Nathan was calmer than me and immediately grabbed his mobile and dialled 999.
‘I already called an ambulance,’ Kenny intervened, but Nathan simply shook his head and held the phone up.
‘I’ll tell them to fucking hurry up, then.’ After tersely reeling off his name and the address he drew in a breath and flashed an agonised glance at Rebecca. ‘Yes, hello, there’s been a disturbance at this address. The police are already on their way, but I have an update for you. My sister-in-law is pregnant, but she’s bleeding … There’s a lot of blood.’ Turning to me, he covered the mouthpiece and frowned. ‘Did my father really hit her like he said? Or is this from the stress?’ he asked, sounding completely horrified.
Swallowing a huge lump in my throat I nodded. ‘ He hit her in the stomach. Punched her. It looked quite hard, like he meant to really hurt her.’
He scrunched his face up with anger, blood rushing to his cheeks as he cast a disgusted glance at the sheet-covered body of his father. ‘Fuck!’ He raised his free hand to his hair, digging in the strands so aggressively that I flinched at the ripping sound.
Returning to the call, he closed his eyes, squeezing them tight shut. ‘She was hit in the stomach. Yes. We need the ambulance immediately.’ He listened for a second and nodded. ‘How quickly can you be here?’ There was a pause, then Nathan let out a relieved breath. ‘OK, thanks. I’ll leave the front door open for you.’
Once he’d hung up, he pocketed his phone and crouched beside Rebecca, lowering his tone to a soft whisper. ‘There’s an ambulance just around the corner, Rebecca. Not long now, OK?’
Rebecca didn’t respond, and I could see that Nicholas was fast losing his control as tears streamed down his cheeks, too. ‘Becky, baby,’ he choked. ‘Can you hear me?’
‘Yes,’ Rebecca finally replied in a tone that was so quiet my heart just about died for her. ‘I’m so sorry, Nicholas,’ she murmured, leaning forwards and wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her head into his shoulder.
‘Stop saying that, this is not your fault. We just want to make sure you’re OK.’ As Nicholas shifted himself closer to Rebecca, I heard the first faint strains of a siren in the air and sent out a silent prayer of thanks that there had been an ambulance so close by.
Nathan gave me a slightly unsteady look. I thought for a second he was going to pass out, but then he tugged at one of his shirt cuffs and almost fell forwards as he peppered my face with kisses. ‘God, I love you so much, Stella.’ His declaration was whispered, but urgent, and I think the shock of the situation was having a similar effect on him as it was on me, making him appreciate how lucky the two of us – and Will – had been.
‘I’m going to go and flag the ambulance down.’ He dropped another kiss on my forehead then jogged away towards the front door. I turned back to the carnage of our living room and hurried across to Kenny to check on him.
The paramedics were amazing, so calm and in control, regardless of the obvious distress that Rebecca and Nicholas were in. As they set about working on Rebecca and Kenny, Nathan went over to Marion and took Will from her arms, holding him close and closing his eyes in relief as he cradled him to his chest and breathed in his scent.
He scanned the chaos of the room in utter confusion before bringing his attention back to me. ‘What the fuck happened here, Stella?’
Shrugging helplessly, I blew out a long breath. ‘I have no idea, we only got here about fifteen minutes before you. Marion was here with Will, then I saw another woman … your mother, I assume … and then your father appeared with the gun.’
Beside me Marion let out a loud sob. ‘Mr Jackson, I’m so sorry, I had no idea. They were at the front door saying they were coming to meet you for lunch, and the woman was so chatty that I started to talk to her and then he … he pulled a gun on me and forced me back inside the house!’ Marion only just managed to get her words out before bursting into tears again.
‘Marion, it’s OK. It’s not your fault, please try and calm down.’ Nathan wasn’t the most sensitive of men, but his attempt at soothing her distress was rather sweet, really. Placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder, I carried on from where she had paused.
‘Rebecca and I got home and as we came in the lounge we found Marion here with your parents. You father had the gun, and ordered us to all sit down. Just before you came in, he had spotted Rebecca’s bump … She was standing up, and called a warning to you and Nicholas, but …’ Sickening images of the bastard hitting her swum in my mind so vividly that I could barely say it. ‘He … he … punched her in the stomach.’ Nathan cursed low under his breath and closed his eyes as I finished. ‘That was basically when you arrived.’
Glancing again at the sheet-covered body on our lounge floor, I shuddered. The man might have been an abusive arsehole, but he was still Nathan’s father, and so I felt I should say something. The problem was, I had no idea what to say. ‘Nathan, I … I know you and your dad had a strange relationship, but I’m really sorr …’ I didn’t get to finish, because Nathan turned to me and shook his head decisively.
‘No. Don’t. He held a gun at your head, and William’s. That piece of shit was no father of mine, and he deserves no sympathy for what has happened.’ Nathan ran a hand through his hair, just like his father had, and frowned. ‘I still don’t understand how he fell over, though.’
‘If he hadn’t tripped, I would have stopped him. I couldn’t let him hurt you boys any more.’ The voice that spoke was timid, and as I glanced around Nathan I saw it belonged to Mrs Jackson. I think we’d both been so caught up in the moment that neither of us had seen her move, but she now stood beside Nathan, gazing up at him with red-rimmed eyes and holding our steel letter opener in her hand.
‘This was on the table beside my chair,’ she explained in an oddly detached tone as she twirled the blade in her hand. ‘ I was just about to go for him with it when he fell. I suppose fate must have intervened.’
‘Jesus, Mum!’ Nathan grabbed the paper opener and flung it onto the dresser before casting a glance at the paramedics, who thankfully seemed too busy to overhear her words.
Mrs Jackson’s eyes filled with moisture and her expression crumpled. ‘I can’t remember the last time you called me Mum … even as a child you hardly ever did.’
For the briefest instant, Nathan’s face visibly paled. Then his well-practised defensive mask fell back in place, leaving him looking almost expressionless. ‘Can you blame me?’ he hissed, before taking a small step away from his mother.
‘No, I suppose not. I’m weak, I always have been, and I know you must hate me for not stopping him when you were younger … But you’re still my boys. I couldn’t stand to watch him abuse you for one more second. I’m glad he tripped.’
Jeez. Talk about emotional. A solid lump had formed in my throat that seemed almost impossible to swallow, a
nd judging from the tension in Nathan’s face, he was experiencing something quite similar himself.
Mrs Jackson gave a limp shrug. She glanced sadly at her husband’s body, shrouded in the sheet. ‘I didn’t want him to die … but if it stops him hurting my family again then maybe it’s better this way.’
After she spoke, she wrapped her arms around her stomach and turned away. She walked to an armchair and slumped into it as if utterly drained.
‘I don’t get it. How could he fall? There’s nothing to trip on. Do you think …’ I paused, trying to be careful about how I worded my next sentence. ‘I mean, he was just in front of your mum’s armchair. Do you think she deliberately tripped him?’
‘If she had, surely she would just have admitted it?’ Nathan chewed on his lower lip, his brows still lowered with confusion. Suddenly, he gave me a look. ‘Let’s check the nanny cams.’
Of course! Nathan was so protective over William that when we’d taken the step of getting Marion he had insisted on installing various hidden cameras around the house to keep an eye on her behaviour. There were two in this room alone. Marion hadn’t ever put a foot wrong, but Nathan had insisted the cameras stay, “just in case”. They might finally be about to come in useful.
I dashed after him to the study and watched as he tapped away on the keyboard and brought up the footage from the first camera. I felt sick to my stomach as I watched Mr Jackson waving the gun around in our faces, but the viewpoint didn’t show anything different to what I’d witnessed myself: he was walking cautiously to the kitchen, and fell. The one good thing was that the images clearly showed Nicholas and Nathan far away from him, so at least the police couldn’t suspect any foul play on their part.
‘I still don’t see what happened to him. Maybe he just lost his footing somehow,’ I murmured, lowering myself to perch on the desk beside Nathan.
‘Me neither. Let’s try the other camera. It faces the room from the kitchen end.’ Nathan whizzed through the footage from the second camera. He played it at normal speed as we watched Mr Jackson spin his face in the direction of the camera when he heard the banging noise. This time, he was walking towards the camera, and as he reached the kitchen door I watched what happened and gasped loudly. Mrs Jackson was in the foreground of the image, and as I looked closely I could see she was gripping the letter opener. Something had tripped him, but it definitely wasn’t her.
